西川——令人生畏、难以把握的诗人

来源:中国文化译研网

作者:

2018-12-10

  近年来,中国文化“走出去”的影响力不断扩大,在全球文化多元化发展日益兴盛的背景下,中国文化译研网(CCTSS)联合中国作家协会《小说选刊》杂志社,启动“新世纪中国当代作家、作品海外传播数据库”项目,将100位中国当代优秀作家的简介、代表作品以及展示作家风采的短视频翻译为10种语言,集结成1000张中国作家名片向全球推介。千张“作家名片”将鲜明地向世界宣告:我是中国作家,我在进行中国创作。


  此种形式和规模是中国故事走向世界的一大创新,会让世界更加全面、客观、公正地了解中国优秀作家作品,同时也是打通中国文化走向世界的“最后一公里”。


  西川,男,原名刘军,诗人、散文和随笔作家、批评家、翻译家。1963年生于江苏,1985年毕业于北京大学英文系。系美国艾奥瓦大学国际写作项目荣誉作家(2002)。曾任纽约大学东亚系访问教授,加拿大维多利亚大学写作系奥赖恩访问艺术家,中央美术学院文学教授、图书馆馆长,现为北京师范大学特聘教授。出版有九部诗集和诗文集,其中包括《深浅》《够一梦》《鉴史四十章及其他》,以及两部随笔集、两部评著、一部诗剧。此外还翻译有庞德、博尔赫斯、米沃什、盖瑞.斯奈德、奥拉夫.H.豪格等人的作品。曾获鲁迅文学奖、诗歌与人国际诗歌奖、中坤国际诗歌奖、德国魏玛全球论文竞赛十佳奖等。其诗歌和批评文章被收入多种选本并被广泛译介,发表于二十多个国家的报刊杂志,包括《泰晤士报文学副刊》《巴黎评论》《写作国际》等。2012年,纽约新方向出版社出版由Lucas Klein英译的《蚊子志:西川诗选》,该书入围2013年度美国最佳翻译图书奖并获美国文学翻译家协会2013年度卢西恩.斯泰克亚洲翻译奖等。


  著名评论家张清华认为西川是一位“令人生畏、难以把握的诗人”。西川表示,当代艺术充满了活力和探索的实验精神,使他始终保持开阔的眼界、对诗歌的敬畏和好奇,以及探索世界的热情。北京大学中文系教授陈晓明评价西川:“少有人像他那样一直在深刻地思考现时代的人的命运,关切我们生活正在丧失的价值。”


  郭文景根据西川长诗《远游》谱写的管弦乐作品由香港管弦乐团在香港文化中心音乐厅首演(2004)。意大利艺术家马科.罗泰利以西川诗歌作为元素之一创作的大型装置作品《诗歌之岛》展出于第51届意大利威尼斯双年展(2005)。孟京辉根据西川作品改编的实验戏剧《镜花水月》上演于墨西哥瓜纳华托第35届塞万提斯国际艺术节(2007)与法国第67届阿维尼翁戏剧节(2013)。


  美国诗人詹妮弗.科诺罗维特评论,“西川作品的形式与声音,感觉有如一些房间,在其中,不可能的思维解说了一切。......在整本书中,他思索,质询,建立,撕裂,重涂,颁布现代中国的含义。这当然是一个巨大的题目,令读者感受到其语言中为表述中国种种对分的动力学搏斗,参与到其在国家与个人、内在对话与公开表达之间的飘忽不定的舞蹈。这些诗歌既不是远距离关照,也不是瞬间印象,相反,我们看到的是一个运用了手中所有手段的头脑——从古代历史到诸般感觉,从哲学家们到烦人的邻居们,而有时最醒目地呈现出来的是一种焦灼感。这里,所谓焦灼应该意指针对固化的虚假的当下感受所采取的行动。” 


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  西川


  Xi Chuan


  Xi Chuan, formerly known as Liu Jun, is a poet, prose writer and essayist, critic, and translator. Born in Jiangsu in 1963, he graduated from the English Department of Peking University in 1985. He is an honorary writer of the International Writing Project of the University of Iowa (2002). He was a visiting professor at the Department of East Asian Studies at New York University. He is a visiting artist at the University of Victoria’s Orion Department of Writing in Canada, and a professor of literature and chief librarian at the Central Academy of Fine Arts. He is currently a Distinguished Professor at Beijing Normal University. He has written nine collections of poems and prose works, including Depth, One Dream is Enough, 40 Chapters of Forensic History and Others, as well as two essays, two reviews, and one poetic drama.


  In addition, he has translated the works of Pound, Borges, Mivosh, Gary Snyder, Olaf H. Haug, and so on. He has won the Lu Xun Literature Prize, the Poetry and People International Poetry Award, the Zhongkun International Poetry Award, and the Top Ten Prize of the German Weimar Global Essay Competition. His poetry and critical articles have been widely selected and widely published in newspapers and magazines in more than 20 countries, including The Times Literary Supplement, Paris Review, and Writing International. In 2012, New York New Directions published Notes on the Mosquito: Selected Poems, translated into English by Lucas Klein, which was shortlisted for the 2013 Best Translation Books Award in the United States and was awarded the Lucien Stryk Asian Translation Prize by the American Literary Translators Association in 2013.


  Famous critic Zhang Qinghua believes that Xi Chuan is a “scary and difficult to grasp poet”. Xi Chuan said that contemporary art is full of vitality and the experimental spirit of exploration, which has kept him open-minded, in awe and curious about poetry, and passionate about exploring the world. Chen Xiaoming, a professor at the Chinese Department of Peking University, commented on Xi Chuan: “Some people like him have been thinking deeply about the fate of people in the modern era and are concerned about the value that our lives are losing.”


  Guo Wenjing’s orchestral works, based on Xi Chuan’s long poem Yuanyou, was premiered by the Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra at the Hong Kong Cultural Centre Concert Hall (2004). One of the Italian artist Marco Rotelli’s large-scale installations, The Island of Poetry, was created based on elements of Xi Chuan’s poetry, and was exhibited at the 51st Venice Biennale (2005). Meng Jinghui’s experimental drama Mirror Flower Water Moon, based on Xi Chuan’s works, was staged at the 35th Cervantes International Art Festival (2007) in Guanajuato, Mexico and the 67th Avignon Theater Festival in France (2013).


  American poet Jennifer Kronovet commented,“Form and voice in Xi Chuan’s work feel like rooms where impossible thinking explains everything. Throughout the book, he reflects on, interrogates, builds up, tears apart, repaints and enacts what modern China means. This is, of course, a huge topic, and one feels the kinetic struggle in language to figure China’s dichotomies; the reader participates in the erratic dance between country and self, between an interior dialogue and a public setting forth. The poems are neither distanced considerations nor fleeting impressions. Rather, we see a mind using everything at hand—from ancient history to the senses, from the philosophers to the annoyance of neighbors, and sometimes what comes through most is this sense of urgency. Here, urgency feels like action against a fixed and false sense of the present.”

责任编辑:王爽